I miss the old community

[tidge]

On 8/25/2023 at 8:54 AM, High_Beam said:

As for the Old Community.  I don't know, Pierce Hawthorne was butt annoying and diminished several episodes.  The last season was pretty wretched to boot except for Keith David being added.

 

Still, a bad episode if Community is better than the best episode of Big Bang Theory.

 

[Starhammer]

On 8/24/2023 at 8:50 PM, Sanguinesun said:

 

Im not sure why there is a comparison to the "old community" being done regarding your disability.  HC has done more to have limiting effects features in game than was when it was live.   While there have been new sets that have come about with powers, the same sort of basis of occurences between them and any older sets powers are not different on that level of consideration.

 

We also have to factor that even if every one had very simplistic visuals attributed to each of their powers, that it doesnt factor that when you're in a group of 48 (ie any major league raids), then each individual attack placed by 48 people is going to have the potential to mimic the effects of common visual seizure triggering effects.  (48 simple effects every 1-3 seconds firing off in either unision or staggered in other words).

 

Understand this isn't being stated to diminish your disability.  It is to point out that your comparison of now to "old community" seems strange or misplaced.

 

However, I recognize your goal to be some way to essentially remove graphically any type graphical renderings that would be seizure triggering from a volunteer player developer team already limited and strapped of people and time resources to perhaps develop a system that would satisfy your specifics for seizure triggering(triggers can vary depending on the individual to varying degrees of course).  

 

So I empathize with your situation, but unless someone has other creative workarounds to offer or the dev team members who could enact a change to accomodate your disability speak up, Im not sure there is much that can be done otherwise.  Im sorry that that then may be the unfortunate case.  ☹️

So, my lament regarding the "Old Community has nothing to do with technical capabilities of the game or efforts to make it more photosensitive friendly, but rather the human social reaction to me trying to politely bow out of a Task Force rather than just logging and ghosting the team, only to have some respond with (like many in this thread) what they think are helpful solutions but don't really work, and more to the point, others making it seem like I'm out of line for putting my health over the good of the TF. I ended up having a minor seizure not long after, so I'm glad I quit when I did, and I'm sure they steamrolled the Manti just fine without me. It's just annoying that in trying to politely leave, I opened myself up to some unnecessary hostility.

And in all fairness, this is nothing specific to this community or game, but rather what seems to be a general phenomena across our culture over the past decade or so... Many people are just meaner. I think social media has caused a shift in how many of us behave towards one another online, even when not in those formats of social media. I just remember in the days of Live, the reaction would not have included hostility 😞

So, rant about the decline of cultural norms aside...

I have seizures, and a few types of them at that (There's quite that variety, and I seem to have gotten the buffet table of seizure disorders). I also suffered a mild stroke when I was about 20. I've recovered very well, but nothing ever gets back to 100%. Obviously, common sense should dictate "I have seizures, maybe I shouldn't play video games" Well yeah, but they've been a part of my lifestyle since my early childhood and Pong and Atari becoming a thing. It's a little late to quit now 😛 They really aren't as bad with many modern PC games as the good ol/bad ol' days of Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis (when many of my favorite games are from. Sadly emulators just don't scratch the nostalgia itch)...those systems used a very flashy graphics format that makes it obvious in hindsight what I had so many more seizures back then. Now days, I have the benefit of being better aware of whether something is likely to trigger and just don't get attached to those games. City of Heroes is, for the most part, pretty safe for me. Most of the time, there is little or no effect (though there's something in the game graphics that consistently makes me sleepy... and if I shut the game down to get some rest, the effect subsides immediately upon shutting down the game, or even looking away from the screen for a minute or two... weird, huh? Any Neurologists in the crowd want to talk about that?)

But for me at least, particle density/effects doesn't seem to make any difference. Same for garish colors (on their own, more on that in a moment). But there are certain power effects that, more often when combined with other particular effects, increase the likelihood of triggering a seizure. The new Storm powerset is bad for me. Not any one of them, but the ones most commonly used at the same time... that cloudy aura, the rain, the snowflake attack, and the lightning pet all work together to create a visual cacophony that is problematic for me. It wasn't a big deal before the new sets. Those effects all existed previously, I even use some on some characters. But they weren't popular or bunched together quite the same. Add in a bright force/sonic defense aura or that electric heal support set, especially that field you can click to move to a new spot... those all together get really bad. There's also a Freakshow Super Stunner power that leaves a lightning field at ground level with is especially problematic even just on it's own sometimes. It's not so much about particle density, but rather visual patterns that don't mesh well together, especially if they have different frequency of intermittence or vividly differing colors. I can stare at a single strobe light and all is fine, but if you wrap a Christmas tree with 2-3 different brands of lights that have different blink patterns, it's dramatically more visually disruptive.

There's just too many combinations for there to be many effective avenues to address this on the development or modding side of things. The best I could hope for is a setting that would hide all ongoing effects from other players... so like armor, disruption field, anything with a significant duration just not showing up. Be nice if all the armor sets that don't also had a "Minimal/No FX" custom option. The orbiting balls of light for Radiation Armor are cool thematically, but at this point if I never saw them again I wouldn't be sad... but I like the power itself 😛 . There was an instance with an Archery Support power where apparently I wasn't the only one having trouble with it... it created a hemisphere of lightning on the ground and I guess it was giving lots of folks headaches. It was one of those that could trigger a seizure in me after just seeing it for a split second at close range... But they changed that to something much easier to look at. Like I said, there's too many, and I'm not a big enough demographic to make a lot of these changes for, but it wouldn't hurt my feelings if either a Dev or Modder was able to make a workaround for some of them. Sadly, mods seem to be mostly limited to audio files and maybe some few costuming or UI things. I guess animated graphics like power FX are a lot harder to tweak.

In the meantime, I'm fine. People are disappointing, but they're still better here than Facebook or Twitter. That said, if you could try to remember, if someone is having trouble, they don't need pity, they don't need a lecture, and they don't need to be made to feel like the bad guy for failure to conform. Kind/Polite acceptance is generally sufficient. If anyone is legitimately curious about the seizure stuff, I have no problem answering questions.

[Captain Fabulous]

10 hours ago, Snarky said:

In no shock to anyone I paint all my colors black, or that muted sickly green yellow common to undead effects.  I would love to get the "Domination" power for Dominators colored to look like something besides a Unicorn fart, but I think i am screwed there.

 

But getting an energy blaster to mute everything because of your needs?  never going to happen

Thing is, if I can't see anything I know they can't see anything either, so it makes it extra baffling to me why someone would go out of their way to do it.

[Snarky]

8 minutes ago, Captain Fabulous said:

Thing is, if I can't see anything I know they can't see anything either, so it makes it extra baffling to me why someone would go out of their way to do it.

I am just trying to look like a vampire from a black and white movie set most of the time.  But yeah, most people that play...

 

[Captain Fabulous]

1 hour ago, Snarky said:

I am just trying to look like a vampire from a black and white movie set most of the time.  But yeah, most people that play...

 

@Snarky when the team mission goes up.



 

[Snarky]

13 minutes ago, Captain Fabulous said:

@Snarky when the team mission goes up.



 

If only i could customize rez to do this!!!

[Sanguinesun]

5 hours ago, Starhammer said:

So, my lament regarding the "Old Community has nothing to do with technical capabilities of the game or efforts to make it more photosensitive friendly, but rather the human social reaction to me trying to politely bow out of a Task Force rather than just logging and ghosting the team, only to have some respond with (like many in this thread) what they think are helpful solutions but don't really work, and more to the point, others making it seem like I'm out of line for putting my health over the good of the TF. I ended up having a minor seizure not long after, so I'm glad I quit when I did, and I'm sure they steamrolled the Manti just fine without me. It's just annoying that in trying to politely leave, I opened myself up to some unnecessary hostility.

And in all fairness, this is nothing specific to this community or game, but rather what seems to be a general phenomena across our culture over the past decade or so... Many people are just meaner. I think social media has caused a shift in how many of us behave towards one another online, even when not in those formats of social media. I just remember in the days of Live, the reaction would not have included hostility 😞

So, rant about the decline of cultural norms aside...

I have seizures, and a few types of them at that (There's quite that variety, and I seem to have gotten the buffet table of seizure disorders). I also suffered a mild stroke when I was about 20. I've recovered very well, but nothing ever gets back to 100%. Obviously, common sense should dictate "I have seizures, maybe I shouldn't play video games" Well yeah, but they've been a part of my lifestyle since my early childhood and Pong and Atari becoming a thing. It's a little late to quit now 😛 They really aren't as bad with many modern PC games as the good ol/bad ol' days of Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis (when many of my favorite games are from. Sadly emulators just don't scratch the nostalgia itch)...those systems used a very flashy graphics format that makes it obvious in hindsight what I had so many more seizures back then. Now days, I have the benefit of being better aware of whether something is likely to trigger and just don't get attached to those games. City of Heroes is, for the most part, pretty safe for me. Most of the time, there is little or no effect (though there's something in the game graphics that consistently makes me sleepy... and if I shut the game down to get some rest, the effect subsides immediately upon shutting down the game, or even looking away from the screen for a minute or two... weird, huh? Any Neurologists in the crowd want to talk about that?)

But for me at least, particle density/effects doesn't seem to make any difference. Same for garish colors (on their own, more on that in a moment). But there are certain power effects that, more often when combined with other particular effects, increase the likelihood of triggering a seizure. The new Storm powerset is bad for me. Not any one of them, but the ones most commonly used at the same time... that cloudy aura, the rain, the snowflake attack, and the lightning pet all work together to create a visual cacophony that is problematic for me. It wasn't a big deal before the new sets. Those effects all existed previously, I even use some on some characters. But they weren't popular or bunched together quite the same. Add in a bright force/sonic defense aura or that electric heal support set, especially that field you can click to move to a new spot... those all together get really bad. There's also a Freakshow Super Stunner power that leaves a lightning field at ground level with is especially problematic even just on it's own sometimes. It's not so much about particle density, but rather visual patterns that don't mesh well together, especially if they have different frequency of intermittence or vividly differing colors. I can stare at a single strobe light and all is fine, but if you wrap a Christmas tree with 2-3 different brands of lights that have different blink patterns, it's dramatically more visually disruptive.

There's just too many combinations for there to be many effective avenues to address this on the development or modding side of things. The best I could hope for is a setting that would hide all ongoing effects from other players... so like armor, disruption field, anything with a significant duration just not showing up. Be nice if all the armor sets that don't also had a "Minimal/No FX" custom option. The orbiting balls of light for Radiation Armor are cool thematically, but at this point if I never saw them again I wouldn't be sad... but I like the power itself 😛 . There was an instance with an Archery Support power where apparently I wasn't the only one having trouble with it... it created a hemisphere of lightning on the ground and I guess it was giving lots of folks headaches. It was one of those that could trigger a seizure in me after just seeing it for a split second at close range... But they changed that to something much easier to look at. Like I said, there's too many, and I'm not a big enough demographic to make a lot of these changes for, but it wouldn't hurt my feelings if either a Dev or Modder was able to make a workaround for some of them. Sadly, mods seem to be mostly limited to audio files and maybe some few costuming or UI things. I guess animated graphics like power FX are a lot harder to tweak.

In the meantime, I'm fine. People are disappointing, but they're still better here than Facebook or Twitter. That said, if you could try to remember, if someone is having trouble, they don't need pity, they don't need a lecture, and they don't need to be made to feel like the bad guy for failure to conform. Kind/Polite acceptance is generally sufficient. If anyone is legitimately curious about the seizure stuff, I have no problem answering questions.

 

I think the way your initial post communicated things led various folks here to believe that you were in expectation for some sort of solution to the factors that pertained to inducing your issue.... and in addition making an overall statement as to the conditions of the player base now being worse to that of the "old community" implying how the game was on live.

 

I recognize then that you're stating above that you're not with the expectation nor intent from your initial post that something from a technical standpoint would be accommodating and that your main focus has been how you felt treated by the community here for the statements you gave concerning others saying things to the effect of "turning down the fx" etc.

 

A few things then I'll offer additionally regarding all that:

 

1. Arguably 90% of the players who play now used to play live.  Thus I'd present to you that live and now are similar if not same folks.  That said and due to the much much much larger set of demographics of players when live, the general consensus (outside of some groomed elitism that rears its ugly head now and then from the communty(but again was also seen plenty on live), has been that live was a much more caustic community than now.

 

2. A devil's advocate point: some of what you originally stated concerning what people told you may well be a mix of just simply their lack of understanding your issues, their poor attempt of suggestions to you due to ignorance of that, and a pinch of confirmation bias from you that they were being overtly negative towards you.

 

3. You've put your challenges out here through, as you say, your venting and that is of course an advocacy for yourself, naturally.  Not a small number of the people in the community do so. I can tell you in the last 4 months that I have encountered, talked with, and been on the listening, and suggestions end of not a small number of people who have many different challenges as well.  At least 3-4 people had challenges related to severe anxiety that prevented them from leaning into the uncomfortability of joining groups.  One I talked with is recovering from a stroke and has limited reaction response to not just playing in general but responding to others.    Lots of people who are not native speakers of English who play but remain mostly quiet to hide that in case they encounter frustrations from others.  And all that is before mentioning those suffering from alchoholism(by their own admission) and various mental issues I wont mention.

 

My point with mentioning all this is --not-- to diminish your frustrations or invalidate them.  It is though to say to you that you're not alone and there are others that are going through their own issues and challenges with play.  Not all of them either may have an understanding or empathy for your situation mind you (due to ignorance or their own above mentioned challenges preventing them from doing so)...  and that too has to be perhaps given consideration when one is able to be mindful there of.

 

I thus at this point can only suggest for you to hopefully surround yourself in play with others who work with you on things as best they can and go from there.

 

Last point(and this is just in jest(lightening things), dont get me started on the "my cat is causing me to drop playing" folks..... 😛  Cats are just archvillains in fur.

[Snarky]

On 8/24/2023 at 12:47 PM, Starhammer said:

It's very disheartening to tell a team I can't continue because the combination of some of the power FX are probably gonna trigger a seizure, only to be told things like "turn the graphics down" (graphics settings won't disable basic power effects), or "Just don't use them" (It's not my powers.) It's not everyone, but more and more, the prevailing opinions seems to be that I have an obligation not to have a disability that is incompatible with other people's characters.

Just venting. Ignore me and move along.

Put on your own life jacket first.  Maybe you can politely discuss what is going on. But it does not matter.  Protect your health.  If you offend someone by quitting without saying something then 1) they are way too easily offended. 2) it does not matter because your health comes first. 
 

There are tons of mature people in this community.  Sure, we dislike it when someone ghosts from a TF.  But we GET IT.  Life, and unlife, has major and minor events that get in the way.  
 

If you are severely incapacitated by a medical event because you “toughed it out” who will post these threads to entertain me?   How about that? Did you stop one second to think of me?  No!   So take care of yourself.  Snarky’s orders.

[Saiyajinzoningen]

On 8/26/2023 at 10:10 AM, Mopery said:

Little known fact, but Unicorns are the only creature with farts that smell like roses.

 

not trying to derail this thread, but how do you know this? (askin for a friend)

 

Also this game has always been a 90's rave light show. 

Which was pure fantastic eye candy when i was young

Now however i hafta wear sunglasses to play radiation armor

 

[Luminara]

14 hours ago, Starhammer said:

People are disappointing, but they're still better here than Facebook or Twitter. That said, if you could try to remember, if someone is having trouble, they don't need pity, they don't need a lecture, and they don't need to be made to feel like the bad guy for failure to conform. Kind/Polite acceptance is generally sufficient.

 

I have social anxiety disorder.  I've made this known to everyone with whom I associate for the past fifteen years.  And without fail, no matter how many times I say it, no matter how well I explain it, no matter how often I decline, I've been invited to social events, asked to stop by for dinner, urged to go hang out, cajoled to accompany So-and-so to meet Other-so-and-so somewhere... I may have even been asked out on a date or two (probably a lot more) without realizing it.  For a long time, I thought people were insensitive, or they didn't understand, or they felt sorry for me, or, perhaps, they just weren't intelligent enough to grasp what I was telling them.

 

Eventually it occurred to me that they wouldn't keep asking if they didn't see something in me that made them want to spend time with me.  For all of my flaws and faults, despite my mental illness, regardless of my oddities, people still consider me to be worth knowing and being around, and they're never going to stop trying to find ways to do that.  When I look at it from that perspective... it's gratifying.  People ask me to spend more time with them, and it's not because they want to throw me a pity party, or to "fix" me, but because I'm me.

 

 

[Snarky]

1 hour ago, Luminara said:

 

I have social anxiety disorder.  I've made this known to everyone with whom I associate for the past fifteen years.  And without fail, no matter how many times I say it, no matter how well I explain it, no matter how often I decline, I've been invited to social events, asked to stop by for dinner, urged to go hang out, cajoled to accompany So-and-so to meet Other-so-and-so somewhere... I may have even been asked out on a date or two (probably a lot more) without realizing it.  For a long time, I thought people were insensitive, or they didn't understand, or they felt sorry for me, or, perhaps, they just weren't intelligent enough to grasp what I was telling them.

 

Eventually it occurred to me that they wouldn't keep asking if they didn't see something in me that made them want to spend time with me.  For all of my flaws and faults, despite my mental illness, regardless of my oddities, people still consider me to be worth knowing and being around, and they're never going to stop trying to find ways to do that.  When I look at it from that perspective... it's gratifying.  People ask me to spend more time with them, and it's not because they want to throw me a pity party, or to "fix" me, but because I'm me.

 

 

I am a bit of an introvert myself. When overwhelmed I tend to just drain the blood of whoever is crowding me.  This has a few effects:

1) obtain blood.  The blood is the life

2) often gives insight into who the person is, why they are like they. This can lead to a sympathetic indulgence towards them

3) they shut up

[Zect]

Firstly: regarding your health condition, my sympathies and I hope you find some way to continue enjoying the game despite it. Seizures are one of the common health risks associated with video games. The solution that immediately comes to mind is some kind of FX mod - unfortunately, you may be forced to make your own if the trigger for your condition is not prevalent among the general population.

 

Secondly: There may or may not be some decline in cultural norms (as you put it), but there is a reason for the reaction of your team. Humans all suffer from a natural cognitive bias where we tend to rely on our own perspective too much, and fail to view things from the perspectives of others. This is known in psychology as egocentric bias (unrelated to the lay concept of egotism).

 

So, for example, your teammates are not able to conceive of a health condition that requires turning X power off because they have never experienced one. Or, they assume that if they suffered from such, surely they would either stop playing the game or have found some way around it, because they rely on their own POV to imagine what they do in such a situation, rather than trying to adopt yours. The egocentric bias also has a number of related effects, one of which is that we tend to believe that our intentions, thoughts, priorities, etc. are more apparent to others than they really are, and that those around us have similar outlooks to us. So, conversely, you may assume the amount of discomfort you are experiencing or the necessity of them turning off their powers is more apparent to your teammates than it is. Or, you may imagine that if you were in their shoes, you would agree to turn off the offending power and then assume that this outlook is shared by the team. I need to emphasize that I am not accusing you of being illogical or anything; cognitive biases are just human nature, no less normal than the blind spot on the human retina.

 

I think everyone has their own cross to carry - even people who are outwardly successful, happy or healthy may be hiding some hidden problem or trauma. So, yes, we should be kind and accepting, as much as possible. However, it's always going to be difficult to request others to accommodate to you; they may be struggling themselves and preoccupied with that, or they may just be laboring under the heaviest cross of all, human nature. All we can do is, where possible, strive to put on our own life jacket first, so that we can be the one handing them out to the next person.

[Mopery]

On 8/27/2023 at 9:44 AM, Saiyajinzoningen said:

not trying to derail this thread, but how do you know this? (askin for a friend)

Sometimes you just gotta stop and smell the unicorn farts.

[SwitchFade]

OP...

 

People are stupid, this is incontrovertible. The good part of the old community is still here. Oft, I abscond due toba maniacal 2 year old, mid-asskick, who gives a downshift if someone is booty-itching over it.

 

Do you, we got you, the haters can cuddle a running blender.

 

Asshats actually do us a favor when they release the stink, we know who to avoid. Besides, life always drives those people into the latrine, where they belong.

 

And people who unknowingly give horrendous medical advice out of good natured ignorance? People are stupid. And that's ok if they mean well.

 

Sometimes I'm stupid, the proof is in the last four paragraphs preceding this sentence.

[Rishidian]

The amazing @Luminara posted this in another thread (I don't know how to quote from there) so I just checked this out and thought it may be something that helps.

 

Increasing the mouse scroll speed in Options doesn't increase the speed at which the camera zooms out.  Could've turned that on two decades ago and saved myself a shit-ton of scrolling.

 

/suppressclosefx 1

/suppressclosefxdist 17

 

Here is the information from https://cityofheroes.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_Slash_Commands

 

/suppressCloseFx	Hide all personal FX when the camera is closer than the suppressCloseFxDist
/suppressCloseFxDist number	Within this camera distance, personal FX will be suppressed.

 

I haven't tried this, but it looks like it may help.

[Luminara]

21 minutes ago, Rishidian said:

The amazing @Luminara posted this in another thread (I don't know how to quote from there) so I just checked this out and thought it may be something that helps.

 

Increasing the mouse scroll speed in Options doesn't increase the speed at which the camera zooms out.  Could've turned that on two decades ago and saved myself a shit-ton of scrolling.

 

/suppressclosefx 1

/suppressclosefxdist 17

 

Here is the information from https://cityofheroes.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_Slash_Commands

 

/suppressCloseFx	Hide all personal FX when the camera is closer than the suppressCloseFxDist
/suppressCloseFxDist number	Within this camera distance, personal FX will be suppressed.

 

I haven't tried this, but it looks like it may help.

 

It's not going to do much on a team.  As it says in the description, it hides personal GFX, but it's actually limited to primarily toggle effects.  For example, on my Dark/Martial/Psi dominator, it'll shut off the bubble created by World of Confusion, and the Domination unicorn fart, but my melee kicks still display the foot glow and strike glow.  And some normally muted toggle effects will persist (can't recall any off the top of my head, but i remember seeing a few on some of my characters).  On a team, it's not going to obscure any teammate effects.  Those Peacebringer WHANG attacks are still going to be like a camera flash going off in your face, for instance, and the PB's toggles are still going to look like a mass coronal ejection.

 

The setting also hides auras, as I recall.  Your character's, not anyone else's.

[StrikerFox]

Excuse my ignorance but what triggers seizures? Is it flashing colors, patterns or movement? A combination? If it's colors, maybe adjusting the monitor's brightness, contrast, hue/saturation etc could help. Make it so the picture is borderline black and white. Maybe there are settings in game that could do similar.

[StrikerFox]

Excuse my ignorance but what triggers seizures? Is it flashing colors, patterns or movement? A combination? If it's colors, maybe adjusting the monitor's brightness, contrast, hue/saturation etc could help. Make it so the picture is borderline black and white. Maybe there are settings in game that could do similar.

[Snarky]

17 minutes ago, StrikerFox said:

Excuse my ignorance but what triggers seizures? Is it flashing colors, patterns or movement? A combination? If it's colors, maybe adjusting the monitor's brightness, contrast, hue/saturation etc could help. Make it so the picture is borderline black and white. Maybe there are settings in game that could do similar.

Mostly caused by duplicate postings

[PeregrineFalcon]

I'm very sorry to hear that the effects in this game cause you distress in any way. That isn't sarcasm, I truly mean that. And I agree that you should definitely put your health and well being above this, or any other, game.

 

However, I completely disagree with your assertion that our community is horrible, and I'm shocked with how disappointed you claim to be with the people in this community. They hear that you're having a problem and their first response is to try to help you. And your reaction is to come to the forums and complain about how horrible the community is.

 

Did one person appear to have a problem with you putting your own health above remaining in the team? Maybe, maybe that happened. Given the tone of your posts I'm not convinced that you didn't just completely misunderstand what they were trying to say. Either way, the 1 or 8 people on your team aren't "the community." Please remember, that not everyone who offers a stray bit of advice is aware of all of the details of your condition. So when they offer a piece of advice that you already know doesn't work, don't get upset at them, just realize that they are trying to help.

 

And no, people aren't meaner now days than they were years ago. I've been dealing with adults for 50 years now. Yes, that's since the 70s. And I can tell you from personal experience that people really aren't much different now than they were back then. People aren't meaner online than they were 10 years ago either. 4chan, the internet's hive of scum and villainy, has been around for over 10 years. People were calling each other horrible names online back in the 90s.

 

I think the OP should consider showing some of that kind and polite acceptance that he wants so desperately to others in our community. Sure, their attempts to help you may be misguided, but you should at least understand that people's hearts are in the right place. They're actually trying to help you.

[ForeverLaxx]

18 hours ago, StrikerFox said:

Excuse my ignorance but what triggers seizures? Is it flashing colors, patterns or movement? A combination? If it's colors, maybe adjusting the monitor's brightness, contrast, hue/saturation etc could help. Make it so the picture is borderline black and white. Maybe there are settings in game that could do similar.

From my (admittedly limited) time spent looking into things, it's pretty unlikely that video games are going to cause a seizure on their own. The warning exists mostly to cover a game company's ass in case some weird edge case happens or someone tries to blame said game for something it didn't do later down the line (and as you'd imagine, this sort of thing happens a lot).

 

The short version is that video games aren't likely to produce a strobe effect fast enough to trigger anything, with common understanding being that a light needs to flash 16-30 times a second to run the risk of causing an event. Even in the infamous "Porygon Episode" where Porygon was unjustly banned from ever appearing in a Pokemon episode again, the children who suffered seizures likely did so only because of the combination of the alternating red/blue light pattern and the poor refresh rate of their screens.

 

Refresh rates being what they are today, seizures triggered from video games are extremely unlikely, but the fear (and warning label) still exists. It's not unjustified, and one exists for legal purposes, but it's pretty overblown in my opinion. That said, it's often better to be safe than sorry.

[Starhammer]

21 hours ago, StrikerFox said:

Excuse my ignorance but what triggers seizures? Is it flashing colors, patterns or movement? A combination? If it's colors, maybe adjusting the monitor's brightness, contrast, hue/saturation etc could help. Make it so the picture is borderline black and white. Maybe there are settings in game that could do similar.

I go into it in a bit more detail in my last post if you scroll up a bit, but it's admittedly a long post that covers a few other subjects first so it's understandable if you missed it.

Short version, it's usually (not always) not any one thing but a combination of contributing factors. In the context of this game, most often it is 2 or more different power effects, likely taking up a lot of screen space, that flash or pulse at different rates/speeds from each other, and are different colors. Increasing likelihood may (but not always) come from extremely bright effects (like a lightning bolt at close range) or especially vibrant different colors. It's almost never just one thing. For instance, I have an elec/elec tank who's powers (and parts of the costume) are all a very vibrant pink, and by herself, she never causes me trouble. Throw in an orange Singularity, a Freakshow Super Stunner, a bright gold Force Field, and a green/purple Storm Blast set, and I'm gonna be taking a break one way or another.

[Techwright]

On 8/27/2023 at 11:49 AM, Luminara said:

Eventually it occurred to me that they wouldn't keep asking if they didn't see something in me that made them want to spend time with me.  For all of my flaws and faults, despite my mental illness, regardless of my oddities, people still consider me to be worth knowing and being around, and they're never going to stop trying to find ways to do that.

 

Hey, it's just not a great thread until Luminara chimes in to mess with everyone.  😁

[DoctorDitko]

/suppressclosefx 1

/suppressclosefxdist 300

 

Will do a lot more good.

Turning off/down particles helps a friend of mine, especially combined with the above.

Graphics card settings can help, also. Play with brightness, contrast, and gamma to see if any help.

 

Expert tip:

There is a utility called Reshade that will allow you to perform post-processing to graphics the game developers never heard of. It's not the easiest thing to use, but it gives you another method to control what you see.

 

Good luck! My migraine-afflicted friends have managed to make this game less triggering, I hope you can as well.

 

And...

Welcome Home!

 

 

Edited September 3, 2023 by DoctorDitko
Added URL

[Luminara]

2 hours ago, Techwright said:

 

Hey, it's just not a great thread until Luminara chimes in to mess with everyone.  😁